Sunday, December 6, 2015

#Autosprawl eating up 73 hectares a day in Germany

Resilience: "In Germany alone urban sprawl gobbles up 73 hectares every day, much of it due to traffic. In 2013, the total area consumed for traffic had already reached 224 m2 per person which, compared to the 46 m2 for housing, is quite a lot. Globally there is an increasing competition on land and soil between industrial infrastructure sprawl including traffic, food production, climate-relevant forests, energy plants and natural habitats. The projected growth of car production and usage would take this competition to an unprecedented level with severe consequences e.g. for food production. Not to mention the gigantic new infrastructures and masses of natural resources and land that would be required to produce, place and host the renewable energy facilities for powering such global electric car-fleets. Finally, renewable energies are end-products of highly industrialized and CO2-intensive processes and far from being unlimited. This prospect is already frightening enough; what if a large percentage of this car-invasion were still powered by petrol or, just as bad, biofuels?"